


It's Fool Proof

by Gnomeskillet



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-18
Updated: 2018-07-05
Packaged: 2019-01-18 21:23:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 3,383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12396507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gnomeskillet/pseuds/Gnomeskillet
Summary: A collection of drabbles, bits, bobs, odds, ends, assorted ephemera, and other such trivialities from itsfoolproof.tumblr.com





	1. Pompeii

There wasn’t much to do after getting kicked out of the only home you had ever known, hatching a brilliant scheme to get back, winging your way through an international crime spree, failing in the final act, and eventually crash landing in the backyard of an international crime fighting organization.

But, you know, that was an awful lot to get through, and he was still licking his wounds so maybe, Junkrat figured, he earned a couple days of sitting around doing nothing. It was hard to just sit around when there were things that needed blowing up, but Gibaltar’s fair weather made it just a bit easier for the time being.

_“I was left to my own devices - Many days fell away with nothing to show”_

A small, handheld radio cobbled together with duct tape and copper wire crooned out a tinny melody, the melancholy music still so full of hope, from its place at Junkrat’s side atop the trailer. He hummed along to the tune, kicking his feet against the wall in time to the beat.

_“And the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we love - Great clouds roll over the hills bringing darkness from above”_

His fingers tapped the rhythm on the side of a bottle, and Junkrat swayed to the music, eyes closed and smiling as the warm sun fell upon his face. It wasn’t nearly as oppressive here as it was back in ‘Straya, that was one thing for certain. The air was nice, fresh, a little salty up here by the watchpoint, but still. Had a good breeze. Very refreshing, very nice.

_“But if you close your eyes - Does it almost feel like nothing changed at all?”_

It wasn’t home, though.

_“And if you close your eyes - Does it almost feel like you’ve been here before?”_

It was far too nice.

_“How am I going to be an optimist about this? - How am I going to be an optimist about this?”_

Could be home, though, he supposed.

He took a swig from his bottle, opened his eyes and looked around. It was nice, there was a beach, Roadie was inside having a nap. Did he really  _need_  to go back to Junkertown? It  _was_  a bit of a hole, after all. The slow radiation poisoning kinda sucked, but hey, he never really expected to live that long anyway. Hated The Queen.

_“We were caught up and lost in all of our vices - In your pose as the dust settled around us”_

But at least he felt like he belonged there. Almost. Not quite. At least he knew what he was getting into when he picked a fight with someone twice his size. At least he could always find work on the mech circuit as a mechanic. Well, at least until he drove all the pilots and barkers crazy and they got fed up with him. At least he could scrounge together enough food to last him through the week. At least if, you know, you considered one or two real meals and slim pickings good enough to last a week. He’d made do with less.

_“And the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we love - Great clouds roll over the hills bringing darkness from above”_

He sighed and closed his eyes, rocking back and forth to the song once more. If he closed his eyes, if he focused on the sun on his face, the distant yelling of whatever the Overwhatses were doing, and the sound of the music, he really did feel like nothing had ever changed.

And when he closed his eyes, ignored the past and focused on the future, it almost felt like he’d been here before.

_“Well, I am going to be an optimist about this - Yeah, I am going to be an optimist about this”_

Maybe they weren’t the right words to the song he was singing, and maybe he couldn’t do much about the rubble or his sins, but he was going to be an optimist about this.


	2. Scream

Jamison stood on the edge of the crater and felt the world drop away from him. The ground ended abruptly at his feet, sloping sharply down into a pit too deep to crawl out of. At the epicenter was another hole, smaller, shallower, with shards of metal scattered across the bottom. As the sun caught on the fragments, sending bright, refracted light beaming into his eyes, something forgotten buzzed at the back of Junkrat’s skull. **  
**

_The sun blazed in the sky, hot, sweltering, blistering with heat, scorching the ground and baking the air. Sheets of metal decorated the landscape, embedded deep in the ground and raising high into the air like monoliths. Smaller fragments littered the ground, the air above them shimmering as they caught the sun’s rays, reflecting and intensifying the heat._

_In the middle of it all, the remains of the Omnium sat like a shell on the beach; uninhabited and open to the elements. The roof was gone and sand blew through the open doorframes, catching the corners and accumulating in drifts. Inside, everything was black, except for the vague outline of bodies._

_There wasn’t a sound but the beat of his heart and the rasp of his breath in his dry, rattling lungs. His skin prickled and crawled, like pork skin pulling away from the meat as it roasted on the grill, and his stomach turned and roiled. He wanted to throw up, but he hadn’t eaten in days._

_So instead, he screamed. He screamed and screamed and screamed until his lungs gave out and he collapsed, scrawny knees hitting the ground first, the rest of him following until he laid out in a heap._

There was only so much sitting around Junkrat could do before he got bored out of his skull. Sure, he could probably explore the watchpoint in all its abandoned glory, but he heard about the crater where Winston crash-landed. Sure, it happened years ago, and the site was probably picked clean of anything interesting, but Junkrat was a scavenger to the bone. There had to be some overlooked treasure he could unearth and salvage.

Something he could take back to the Watchpoint triumphantly. Something other than the pricking of his skin, the twist of his stomach, and the unbearable urge to scream.


	3. Close Encounters of the Epic Sax Kind

It’s the middle of the day. Perhaps you’re on your way to town, planning on stocking up on supplies. Maybe you’re just out for a walk, enjoying the fresh air. Maybe you actually need Junkrat for something, and you’ve come to find him. Regardless of your purpose, your path takes you near the Junkers’ trailer. **  
**

That’s when you start to hear it.

It starts as a low rumbling, a pulsing beat that causes the small rocks that are scattered around to shake and clatter. As you get closer, a high note joins the bass, [a sassy sax tune](http://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DpriL1XqhCYg&t=OGE0N2M5MDRkODRlYmM1YzdiYjYwY2E5N2UwM2RmZjRjOGU5YmYwYyxZdzN2cVJIWA%3D%3D&b=t%3Au_inGoXUq8AE87X5Yjz4qw&p=https%3A%2F%2Fitsfoolproof.tumblr.com%2Fpost%2F165019651729%2Fits-the-middle-of-the-day-perhaps-youre-on-your&m=1) that repeats over and over again. The trailer shakes in time to the music, and part of you is afraid to get any closer, wary of what you might find.

Then, through trailer’s small windows, you see him:

_Junkrat._

Wearing nothing but a pair of red tighty-whiteys, holding a coffee pot in one hand, a blow torch in the other, he dances to the music, waggling his hips and bouncing up and down. With every upswing of the sax, he turns 90 degrees clockwise, until he’s facing the window. You try to run, try to find cover, but it’s too late.

He’s spotted you.

Without missing a beat, the bouncing turns into pelvic thrusts as he waggles his tongue and his eyebrows at you. You wonder what you’ve done to deserve this. You wonder why he’s like this. You sigh and continue on your journey.


	4. Getting the Rip-Tire Ready to Roll

 

>   **"So do you control the rip-tire, or does it just do what it wants?"**
> 
> _"Oh yeah, it just does whateva the hell it wants. Like, s’got a couple protocols it follows regarding priority targets and the like, bigger groups are better after all! Buuuuuuuuuuuut mostly I just let it do it’s own thing._
> 
> _I mean, what’s the worst it’s gonna do? It’s just a tire with a bomb strapped to it for chrissake! Sure, there’s some old drone bits for navigation, and I spent like, psshhhffft, maybe an hour writing code, so I mean. I guess it’s a liiiiittle teensy bit more involved, but still-!_
> 
> _IT’S A FUCKING TIRE THAT GOES ZOOM AND BLOWS SHIT UP!!! That’s like the best KIND of tire!"_

Parts and scrap, as it turned out, were far more plentiful in the outside world than they were in Junkertown. Walking into a scrap yard was like wandering into a Christmas wonderland of joy and delight. It was all _garbage_ to the average person, but oh! The things he could find there, in such abundance, any one of the Junkers would kill to have access to such glorious loot. Happy birthday indeed!

As a result, it was surprisingly easy to get his hands on tires. Despite the fact that many vehicles had made the switch to mag lev technology, most landfills and scrap yards were still filled to the brim with old tires just laying around, not doing a heck of a lot. There just wasn’t a lot you could do with them besides cut them up and use them as filler, or burn them, or you know, generic repurposing type things.

Okay, there was plenty do with them, but they were still made and replaced at an overwhelming rate, so they just tended to accumulate. The fact of the matter was that when Junkrat waltzed into a landfill and requested a few tires, most times they were happy to see them go. Good riddance to bad rubbish, as the saying went.

Once he got his haul back to the trailer, he strapped on his welding goggles, pulled out his tools, and went to work.

The first course of action was to nail down the aesthetic - literally. Eight huge railroad sized nails were driven through the tires from the inside with a sledge hammer, the spikes fitted over the top of them like caps and secured in place. A metal hoop was mounted on the heads of the nails, providing a place to mount the engine that powered the tire. Sometimes, he built the engine himself from scratch; mostly he salvaged them from the same scrap yards where he got his tires.

The engine sat in the lower half of the tire, the metal hoop running through it like treads on a tank. In the upper half of the tire was a set of gyros and weights responsible for keeping the wheel balanced upright as it turned left, right, or flew through the air. Disassembled drones provided a camera positioned in the center of the hubcap, as well as the processor used to take in environmental damage and make navigational decisions. Throw in a bit of extra code, whipped up by Junkrat in about an hour at an internet cafe in Hong Kong and copied endlessly onto as many thumbdrives as Junkrat could get his greedy little hands on, and well!

You had yourself a Rip-Tire, now didn’t you? All it needed was a nice little cover to keep all the bits from falling out, and a length of chain for easy transportation. Usually took him all day to put together, but then, he usually built them in batches of four, so he considered it a day well spent.

Now, he lashed the lot of ‘em to the roof of the trailer, yanking hard on length of chain until he unbalanced himself and toppled backwards. That was bound to keep the tires safe and secure until he needed them, right? Scrambling over them, he gave each tire one last check to make sure everything was properly welded down and connected, then he grabbed a beer from the cooler and threw himself down among them.

As he spread himself out, getting comfortable in the center of his bombs, the radio played some wistful, nostalgic sort of tune. Yep, good day. Good day. Good tires. He patted them all fondly, then leaned back, soaking up the last rays of the setting sun. Good day, indeed.


	5. Chapter 5

“Why did you think it might be a good idea to set that on fire ?”

Jamison never thought he’d be the one to say something like that, but well.. Overwatch did weird things to people. It was Jamison’s firm belief that it was no coincidence that Overwatch was filled with cowboys and ninjas and ridiculous old men in giant battle armor; it didn’t matter how sane you started, sooner or later, something inside you just snapped.

Case in point, the Omnic monk floating sheepishly in front of a scorched server tower, the air pungent with the smell of ozone and burnt plastic. Normally, the tin can was about as passive as a doormat, and yet here he was, pulling exactly the same kind of stunt Jamison would be scolded for.

“It contained sensitive information regarding one of our agents, and I felt it was prudent to keep it from falling into the wrong hands,” Zenyatta explained, his voice soft as he kept his face tilted away, pointedly refusing to meet Jamison’s eyes.

“Couldn’t you have just, I dunno, deleted the files?” Jamison asked, raising his eyebrows. He scratched his head as he moved to inspect the ruined server, one hand coming to a rest on his hip. Normally, he wouldn’t mind the destruction of other people’s properties, but WHEW, did it smell! 

“A skilled technician could easily recover any deleted files,” Zenyatta huffed, watching as Jamison crouched down and started poking at the server. 

Once the side cover was off, a plume of thick, black smoke wafted into the air, causing Junkrat to cough, gag, and flap irritatedly until it cleared.

“In fact,” Zenyatta added, tilting his head to the side, “I believe the job title of “Data Recovery Specialist” refers specifically to individuals who excel at extracting data from supposedly deleted harddrives.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Jamison waved him off, barely paying attention to the robot as he peered into the server. After a second or two of rummaging around, he pulled out a piece of circuitboard, his face contorting in a grimace, nose wrinkled up and tongue stuck out as he held it out at arm’s length. Yep, there sure was a lot of blackened bits and melted plastic alright. Anyone trying to get anything outta this scrap heap was going to have their work cut out for them, s’truth.

“Jamison,” Zenyatta murmured, his voice still soft but somehow louder than before. Jamison was startled to find that the Omnic had leaned down next to him, his creepy blank face just inches from Jamison’s ear.

“Whaaaaaat?” he yelped, unconsciously pulling away, his shoulders hunched up and arms pressed protectively to his chest. Jesus christ, bloody fucking Omnic’s sneaking up on him like that, making him jump damn near out of his skin, if it wasn’t Zenyatta, why he’d oughtta-

“Jamison, there are several more servers inside the facility in need of disposal,” Zenyatta said, a small smile in his otherwise mild and soothing voice. “Perhaps I could use a lesson in, ah….”

He sat back, his head tilted back and a thoughtful finger tapping the side of his chin. “...In “destroying the evidence,” if you be so kind?”

Zenyatta tilted his head to the side, head knowingly inclined towards Jamison. For a moment, he simply sat there, scowling in confusion as he tried to decipher the bot’s meaning. Zenyatta couldn’t possibly be asking him to blow something up.

…...Or could he?

“You mean….?” As his eyes lit up with hope, Jamison trailed off, leaning expectantly towards the Omnic. With a chuckle, Zenyatta moved to the side, gesturing with one hand towards the door leading into a building, looking towards it, but glancing back as if to encourage Jamison’s interest.

As if he needed encouragement.

With a manic little giggle, Jamison was on his feet, bounding towards the door as quick as his peg leg could carry him. “Oh, you’ve picked the right man for the job!” he enthused, grinning from ear to ear and waggling a finger in Zenyatta’s direction. “By the time I’m done with ya, not only will we have blown this building sky high, but we’ll have you plotting capers man can only dream of!”

“I would be satisfied with just the data servers, if you don’t mind,” Zenyatta replied, sounding amused as he floated along.

“Nah, see, you’re doing it wrong already! You gotta think big! BIGGER! There’s a whole world out there in need of explosions, you can’t just settle for what’s right in front’a you!”


	6. After the World's End

Three days after the world ended, Jamie saw him. A man as tall as the sky and as wide as the desert sitting motionlessly on the edge of camp. A khaki canvas jacket protected his broad shoulders from the sun, and long black hair obscured his face, an air of somber gravity surrounding him. For a while, Jamie watched him staring out over the outback, but then an adult snapped fingers in his face, and Jamie had to go back to work.

When he next got a chance to look, the man was gone.

Three days later, Jamie saw him again. He staggered into camp covered in blood with a feral pig slung over his shoulder, saying nothing as he waded through stares and muttered whisperings. This time, Jamie got close enough to see that his jacket, now splashed and stained muddy red, matched the jacket his mom wore the day the world ended.

Jamie didn’t get a chance to get any closer, but that night, everyone ate until their stomachs were full, and Jamie fell asleep to dreams of his mother fighting against the omnics side by side with the man as strong as a god.

In the morning, the man was gone. Though he searched every chance he got, Jamie couldn’t find him. He vanished just as suddenly and completely as he had the first time. It was fair, in Jamie’s opinion. How was Jamie supposed to say hello to him if the man kept taking off like that?

A week later, Jamie finally got his chance as the sun set on the camp and the evening rations were given out. Once again, the man sat on the edge of camp, utterly motionless as he contemplated the scorched landscape. Hunk of bread and mug of soup in hand, Jamie ducked and darted his way to the man’s side. As he sat down, Jamie felt the man tense, then relax with a grunt of “Get lost, kid.”

“Why are always by yourself?” Jamie asked instead, ignoring the command as he dunked bread the same consistency and flavor as cardboard into soup that was little more than broth and a few chunks of gristle. After a moment or two of silence passed, Jamie looked up him, catching sight of ugly red scars and deep brown eyes through the man’s dark curtain of hair. “My mom had a jacket like that, yanno.”

For just a moment, Jamie thought he saw the man’s eyes go wide, then he looked sharply away, grumbling quietly under his breath. In between grumbles, Jamie thought he heard something like “guess you can stay,” which was as good as Jamie expected to get. With a sip of his soup, he climbed into the man’s lap, resting his head against a warm, round belly as the man let out a sigh of resignation.

That night, Jamie fell asleep feeling the safest he ever had since the end of the world, curled up on the strong man’s lap, half tucked underneath the khaki jacket. The next morning, all that was left of the man was his jacket, still wrapped around Jamie’s tiny body. He tried to hide it away some place where he could find it later, when it would fit him better, but one of the older girls caught him stuffing it beneath some scrap and snatched it from him with an ugly laugh. It was too big for her too, but only just.

Jamie never saw the big man again, no matter how hard he looked.


End file.
